Herod the Great, who died soon after our Saviour was born; or of Herod Antipas, who reigned at the time of his personal ministry; since neither of them were native Israelites, and it cannot well be supposed, that any Jews were so ignorant as to take a foreigner for the Messiah, who had been so expressly promised them to be raised up among themselves, of the tribe of Judah, and of the house of David. Besides, supposing any of them had been so stupid as to apprehend the first Herod to be the Messiah, no doubt his death, to say nothing of his wicked and odious administration, would long since have convinced them of their mistake; since he had been very far from accomplishing the deliverance of Israel from all oppression, which they expected from the Messiah. And as for the second Herod, his dominions were small, and his power little, in comparison with the former; Judea now being reduced into the form of a Roman province; so that he was little more than the procurator of Galilee, with the title only of king. It is therefore utterly inconceivable, that any should take him for the Messiah. The most probable opinion concerning the Herodians seems to be that of Dr. Prideaux,* that they derived their name from Herod the Great, and were distinguished from the Pharisees and other Jews, by their falling in with Herod's scheme of subjecting himself and his dominions to the Romans, and likewise by complying with many of their heathen usages and customs. In their zeal for the Roman authority they were diametrically opposite to the Pharisees, who esteemed it unlawful to submit, or pay taxes, to the Roman emperor; an opinion which they grounded on their being forbidden by the law to set a stranger over them, who was not one of their own nation, as their king. The conjunction of the Herodians, therefore, with the Pharisees against Christ, is a memorable proof of the keenness of their resentment and malice against him; especially, when we consider that they united together in proposing to him an ensnaring question on a subject which was the ground of their mutual dissension; namely, whether it was lawful to pay tribute to Cæsar; and provided he answered in the negative, the Herodians would accuse him of treason against the state and should he reply in the affirma• Prideaux's Connect. part ii. book v. sub fin. tive, the Pharisees were as ready to excite the people against him, as an enemy to their civil liberties and privileges. It is probable the Herodians were distinguished likewise by their compliance with some heathen idolatrous usages which Herod had introduced; who, as Josephus saith, built a temple to Cæsar near the head of the river Jordan,* erected a magnificent theatre at Jerusalem, instituted pagan games,† and placed a golden eagle over the gate of the temple of Jehovah ; and, as he elsewhere intimates, furnished the temples which he reared in several places out of Judea, with images for idolatrous worship, in order to ingratiate himself with the emperor and the people of Rome; though to the Jews he pretended, that he did it against his will, and in obedience to the imperial command.§ This symbolizing with idolatry, upon views of interest and worldly policy, was probably the leaven of Herod, which our Saviour cautioned his disciples against. It is farther probable, that the Herodians were chiefly of the sect of the Sadducees, who sat loosest to religion of all the Jews; since that which is called by St. Mark, chap. viii. ver. 15, the leaven of Herod, is, in the parallel place in St. Matthew, chap. xvi. ver. 6, styled the leaven of the Sadducees.|| * Antiq. lib. xv. cap. x. sect. iii. p. 776. + Cap. viii. sect. i. ii. p. 766. De Bell. Judaic. lib. i. cap. xxxiii. sect. xxiii. p. 139. § Antiq. lib. xv. cap. ix. sect. v. p. 772. See on this subject, Prideaux's Connect. part ii. book v. sub fin.; Basnage's History of the Jews, book ii. chap. xiv. JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. CHAPTER I. OF THE TABERNACLE AND TEMPLE. HAVING, in the last Book, given an account of the most remarkable civil and ecclesiastical persons, officers, and sects among the Jews, we now proceed to the consideration of the most eminent structures, or places, which were esteemed sacred, or held in high veneration amongst them. On this head, Godwin treats first of the tabernacle and temple, though indeed but imperfectly, especially of the former; on the description of whose structure and sumptuous furniture Moses has bestowed almost as many pages as he has lines on his account of the creation of the world; no doubt because the tabernacle was a designed emblem of the blessings of the new creation, which far excelled those of the old; or, as the apostle styles it, was "a figure for the time then present;' Heb. ix. 8, 9. We have an account of three public tabernacles before the building of Solomon's temple : αυτού. The first, which Moses erected for himself, 15-non venatahlo, Exod. xxxiii. 7; and this the Septuagint calls τηv okηvny In this tabernacle he gave audience, heard causes, and inquired of God; and perhaps, also, the public offices of religious worship were performed in it for some time, and therefore Moses styled it the tabernacle of the congregation. The second tabernacle was that which Moses built for God, by his express command, partly to be a palace of his presence as the king of Israel, chap. xl. 34, 35, and partly to be the medium of the most solemn public worship, which the people were to pay to him; ver. 26-29. This tabernacle was erected |